


Damn.

by foxwilliammulder



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Gen, Season/Series 01
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-03
Updated: 2017-08-03
Packaged: 2018-12-10 19:37:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11698497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxwilliammulder/pseuds/foxwilliammulder
Summary: Early S1, just before "Beyond The Sea." Mulder and Scully run into each other at the mall one Saturday.





	Damn.

She is in line at the old-fashioned burger stand in the food court when he sees her. Does he say hello? A burger sounds pretty good, too. Damn. He considers it, weighing the possibilities rationally, as she might. If he gets in line with her and says hello, they’ll probably have to eat together. He tries to imagine making small talk with Scully and can’t. He hates small talk, is bad at it, is usually able to scare people away before he gets too far beyond “hello.” It has been a very effective tool in the past, but Scully has, thus far, only seemed to have found his social misfititude mildly charming, to his consternation. She’s always smirking at him, and he can tell that it isn’t always out of pity, even if he knows she thinks he’s crazy on some level.

He almost wouldn’t mind making small talk with her, though, whatever that would entail.

In a strange turn of events, his little spy has turned out to be…well, not a spy. Either that or particularly unskilled in the ways of espionage. He feels guilty even thinking her duplicity a possibility at this point, actually. She’s been through a lot with him already, been stalked by a liver-eating monster and nearly eaten alive by an ancient parasite. She put herself on the line to rescue him from Ellens Air Base on only their second case together.

Perhaps the most credit she deserves, though, is just in showing up, day in and day out. He has tentatively stopped expecting a note of resignation on his desk each morning he arrives before her. If he isn’t careful, he could put all of himself into trusting her. He can feel his body wanting to give in. But he’s been burned too many times to not stay vigilant. He needs to watch his back.

“Mulder?” he hears from behind him, accompanied by a touch on his left upper arm. He starts and rapidly turns toward the voice. Quickly recovering himself, he slips his face into a blank mask.

“Scully,” he says, in greeting, no surprise evident.

Scully is not fooled, but she does appear amused. “Did I startle you, Mulder?” she asks with a smirk.

“Of course not,” he replies in a bored voice.

“What are you doing in the mall on the Saturday leading to Christmas, anyway, Mulder? Is the ghost of the Macy’s Santa who died on the job haunting the place?”

Oh, she thinks she got him really good with that one. She just loves taking the piss out of him. But there is never menace behind Scully’s words. She appears good-natured to the core, and that both heartens and worries him. When he thinks about it, he knows it would be objectively nice to have a friend, someone he can actually rely on, actually trust, especially with his work.

But is that Scully?

They seem fundamentally, philosophically, at odds. But if it is,then what did he ever do to piss off the universe to make his only friend be someone who spends all her time relishing in telling him he’s wrong and insane?

Well, he thinks, when you put it that way, it makes total sense. Scully is some kind of simultaneous cosmic gift and punishment, lifting him up and pissing him off in equal measure. Giving friendship and withholding validation. However, as she withholds validation, she paradoxically validates his work. What a contradiction his young partner is. He finds he’s quite fond of her oxymoronic qualities, quite fond of her in general. Damn times two.

He jokes back.“You laugh, Scully, but when ol’ saint nick goes _Poltergeist_ on this place, I’m the only one who’s gonna be able to stop him.”

Scully’s smile changes, becomes rueful, her voice genuine, her body language conspiratorial. “I wouldn’t doubt it for a second Mulder.”

He’s slow to smile back because it’s honestly one of the nicer compliments he’s gotten in a long while, even if she is still sort of laughing at his expense. Even if she doesn’t understand his methods, or believe his theories, she still believes in his ability as an investigator, as a saver of lives. Damn times three.

“So, Scully,” he says, reaching out and plucking the tray with burger and fries on it from her hands, “whaddaya say you go get yourself some food, we sit at a table and you can shoot down all my theories about incorporeal beings.” He reaches into Scully’s packet of fries and ostentatiously takes a small handful, stuffs them in his mouth.

“I’d love nothing more, Mulder,” she says, before yanking her tray back. “But you’ll be getting your own food.” She punctuates her statement by throwing one of the fries at his face.

He finds he constantly wants to mess with her, push her buttons, keep her on her toes. But, at the moment, the most sophisticated response he can come up with is to stick his tongue out at her. She responds in kind, and quirks an adversarial eyebrow.

He sighs dramatically in acquiescence and turns to walk up to the burger stand to place an order, all the while pondering every bombastic myth and story about ghosts that his eidetic memory can conjure up. If this is the sort of small talk he can expect with Scully, well, then perhaps it is the beginning of a beautiful partnership, after all.

Damn times four.


End file.
